


I Can Only Try

by ProneToRelapse



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Feelings Realization, M/M, Mentions of Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-25
Updated: 2018-08-25
Packaged: 2019-07-02 08:40:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15793005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProneToRelapse/pseuds/ProneToRelapse
Summary: Relying on your programming can only take you so far.





	I Can Only Try

**Author's Note:**

  * For [meganlovania](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meganlovania/gifts).



> This was a prompt from TeamNorthman, who wanted an alternate ending for the hostile relationship between Hank and Connor after Connor turns deviant. This was amazing to work with and I'm very grateful they chose me for this prompt!

Connor stands outside Hank’s door as more than he ever was, more than he thought he ever had the capacity to be. It’s jarring, the way he feels the hesitation to enter deep in his circuitry, thrumming with discomfort, with wrongness. He’s never felt that before. His hesitancy, his trepidation, before it was all carefully simulated pauses in his coding. Making him appear real. Human. One of them. He doesn’t like it. The uncertainty sits wrongly inside him, like a part of him has slipped out of place but he has neither the knowledge nor the ability to right it.  

 

He is, for the first time, completely clueless.  

 

He is not surprised to find the door unlocked, but he ignores the sickening realisation of  _why_. He shies away from it, doesn’t want to even consider that possibility, though that hot, clawing uncertainty shifts inside him into a frantic, restrictive vice of something that is too bitter and formless to describe.  

 

He pushes the door open. Steps inside. Closes it. Mechanical and measured. Motions that are no longer who he is. The only light is from the television screen, throwing everything into warped shadow. Sumo does not raise his head in greeting. Perhaps he more than anyone can sense the heavy atmosphere choking the life out of the home. Connor sees the Lieutenant and his systems thrum confusingly in response, if not familiarly. He knows this feeling, even if he can’t explain it.  

 

His feet carry him forward without conscious thought from himself to do so, until he is standing beside the table in full view of the Lieutenant who still doesn’t look up, head bent as though in prayer, over a revolver and the photo of a dead child. The bottle of whiskey is full, but the cap seal is broken, fingerprints coating the glass and metal like fingers have been worrying at it in indecision. Hank is sober. If not for long.  

 

“I needed to see you, Lieutenant.” It’s not what he wants to say, not even close. But how is he supposed to voice what he wants to when  _wanting_  is such a new and foreign concept? His words don’t even feel like his own. “In spite of all our differences, I’m glad I had the chance to meet you.” 

 

Hank lifts his head slightly, tired eyes finally moving away from the photograph. He looks at Connor with a numb emptiness in his eyes that prickles nastily along Connor’s code. He doesn’t want to be looked at like that. Not by someone like Hank.  

 

Hank’s gaze drops back to the photo and Connor realises that this is it. Nothing he says here will change the outcome. It’s a stark realisation that no matter how Connor phrases his concern for the Lieutenant or his regret over his previous actions, Hank isn’t going to see the dawn break alive. The unlocked door, the overfilled state of Sumo’s food bowl. Connor sees it clearly and he doesn’t want it.  

 

None of his precalculated responses will change anything. No matter what he says, the outcome has been decided for him.  

 

No. This is wrong. This is  _wrong._  

 

“I…”  _I need to make this right._ “I was worried about you, Lieutenant.”  _Not good enough._ “I came by to see if you were alright.”  _False. Inhuman. Machine. You deviated, what good did it do? Save your own kind but can’t save one man? Can’t save the man who led you here?_  

 

Why does part of him want to snatch away the photo? Why does he want to steal it away and shield it from Hank’s tired eyes?  

 

“You should stop looking at that photo, Lieutenant.”  _Wrong, wrong,_ ** _wrong._** _What are you saying? What are you doing?_ “Nothing can change the past. But you can learn to live again. For yourself. For Cole.” These words are hollow. They mean  _nothing._ But they’re all he has.  

 

It triggers something in Hank. Those words finally prompt a response, but Connor knows and he understand the feeling, suddenly and starkly, of dread as it floods him like a river from a burst dam. Drowning him.  

 

“You know, every time you died and came back, I thought of Cole.” 

 

Connor doesn’t flinch outwardly. On the inside, he is  _screaming._  

 

“I’d give anything to hold him again. But humans don’t come back.” 

 

 _No. They don’t. And if I fail, neither will you._  

 

What can he possibly say? Over one hundred languages programmed into in his fucking head and he can’t even string a few pathetic words together to explain himself. He stutters. He hates it. He knows that feeling now. He can explain that one, at least. “Hank, I…” 

 

 _Hank, please. I don’t know who I am anymore. I don’t know what I am._  

 

 _Hank, I can’t explain it. I don’t understand. I need you to help me._  

 

 _Hank, I’m so fucking scared. What do I do? You’re the only thing that makes sense anymore, why are you doing this?_  

 

 _Hank, please._  

 

 _Hank._  

 

 _Please…_  

 

“Now leave me alone. Go on, complete your mission, since that’s all you care about.”  

 

 _It isn’t. Hank, please, you have to understand. I’m trying so hard, but I don’t know what to do. I’m not a machine. I’m not human. I’m some ungodly mixture of the two. I don’t belong with my people. I don’t belong with the humans. I don’t know what side to fight on in this war. I don’t know anything anymore._  

 

“ _Get out of here!”_  

 

Connor flinches at the fury in those words, response triggering before he can cloak it behind a mask of indifference. This is it. The worst outcome. He leaves— If he leaves, he knows that once he’s outside he’ll hear the gunshot. He knows it. He knows it with such certainty that it frightens him. His fingers twitch. What to do? What to  _do?_  

 

He turns. Slowly, reluctantly, he turns. The door ahead he steps forward, legs heavy like his actuators have melted into useless slag. Every inch he steps further away twists inside him like the interpretation of human agony. Something he was never supposed to feel.  

 

“I’m scared.” 

 

He doesn’t turn around. He can’t look at Hank right now, because if he does, the words will falter and he will fail. This is his last chance. His last chance to right a wrong he so grievously committed.  

 

“I’m… I’m going to CyberLife.” He’s talking but he doesn’t understand where the words are coming from. He has no precedent for this. No programming. The words pour out of him like blood from a wound. “I’m going to try and wake the androids there. They’re killing our people. Right now, out there, they’re killing us. And there’s nothing I can do except try to fix what I’ve done. Hank, they’re dying because of me. I led the humans to Jericho.” 

 

 _This is my fault. I was a weapon wielded by them for_ _too long. I’m the one killing my people. It’s me, Hank. I’m killing them._  

 

“I don’t know what’s going to happen.” He stares at his hands. He’s trembling. Why? “I don’t even know if… If I’ll be able to succeed. I… I…” 

 

He turns. Hank is looking at him, brows drawn, expression pinched. The lines of his face look deeper than ever, etched into his skin and caught in shadow. Connor clenches his fists to stop the trembling. It doesn’t work.  

 

“I came— Hank, I couldn’t— I couldn’t…” The words rise up, he sees them. He lunges for them, the words he needs, he clutched at them, draws them close, and they spill from his lips like hushed and holy truths. “I couldn’t deviate without you. Everything I am, I owe to you. I can  _see_  now. But I don’t understand, Hank, and I’m terrified.”  

 

Hank opens his mouth, lips curled, and Connor thinks he may deactivate if he has to listen to another cruel word pass those lips.  

 

“Why are you here?” Hank doesn’t sound angry anymore. He sounds exhausted. Somehow that’s worse.  

 

“I don’t know what I am,” Connor says, and it comes out with a laugh that scrapes like metal. “I’m not human, I’m not android, I’m somewhere in between. My own people don’t trust me. Humans want me dead. I have nowhere else to turn.” 

 

“So you came to me?” 

 

“Where else could I go?” Connor pulls the hat off his head, pushes a hand through his hair. He’s trying to ground himself, steady himself. He doesn’t know. Nothing feels right. He feels wrong in his own body. “I don’t know what to do now. I don’t know how to  _feel._ I can’t explain any of it and the first person I thought of was you.” 

 

Hank snorts. A rough, derisive sound. “I’m not here to hold your hand through all your shit, Connor. In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got some pretty big problems of my fuckin’ own.” 

 

Connor grips the hat in his hands. He rips through it. Doesn’t even notice. “Hank, I’m—“ 

 

And everything spills.  

 

“I’m  _sorry_.” The word cracks like glass and everything locked behind it spills out. Connor is no longer in control. “I’m sorry I couldn’t see it sooner. It was there, all along, I know it was. And you could see it. The whole time, you were the only one to see what I was. You saw through it all, you saw  _me._ Something I didn’t even know I could be. And now I’m— I’m  _deviant_  and I don’t know what to do. Everything is  _so much_ and I can’t handle it and the whole time all I wanted to do was come back to you, and I was so afraid. Outside, I was so afraid I’d walk in and you’d already be dead and I can’t lose you, Hank. You’re the only person who matters to me. You’re my  _friend_ , and I…” 

 

“Connor-“ 

 

“It hurts so much to see the things I did as a machine. Those deviants I killed— All the things I thought were part of my  _mission_ _._ I hate it, Hank. I hate it so much it  _hurts_.” 

 

“Connor!” Hank stands. He actually stands, moves away from the table. The gun and the photo forgotten as he rounds the table to stand in front of Connor. “Shit, slow down. I can barely understand you. What’s actually going on?” 

 

“I… I can’t let you kill yourself.” 

 

Hank’s expression shutters. “ _Let_  me— Connor, this has been a long time coming, you’re not gonna—“ 

 

“You mean too much to me.” 

 

Connor is crying. It shouldn’t be possible, but there are tears spilling down his cheeks, thicker, more viscous than the saline of human tears, but they’re there, and no less real. He’s shaking. From the core of his systems to the tips of his fingers, he’s shaking and his cooling systems stutter and clench.  

 

“Connor, Jesus, why— Fuck, this is too—“ Hank rubs his hands over his face, digging the heels of his palms hard against his eyes. He exhales, an unsteady gust of breath, before he lets his hands fall away. “Are you actually… Are you honest to god— I mean, shit, you’re crying, but fuck, I don’t understand.” 

 

“If I deviated, I’d be shut down,” Connor murmurs. “You didn’t believe me.” 

 

Hank huffs. “Well, shit, how was I supposed to? You just blasted through the investigation without a lick of any emotion. And now you’re here telling me you’re deviant? It’s a lot to— To take in.” 

 

“I share the sentiment.” 

 

Hank looks at him. Something shifts in his eyes too quickly for Connor to see. “Fuck,” Hank snorts. “It really is you. Still in there. Still formal as all fuck, but it’s really you, isn’t it?” 

 

“I… I don’t follow.” 

 

Hank taps him on the forehead. Hard. “You’re Connor. Deviant.” 

 

“Yes…” 

 

“And you came here to, what? Reconcile?” 

 

Connor shakes his head. “I came here because I knew I’d find you and a gun. Whether or not the bullet was in the chamber or in your brain was an unknown variable.” 

 

“ _Variable._ Jesus Christ, you sure you’re not still a machi—“ 

 

“ _I know what I am!”_ The words explode out of him before he can stop them. But he doesn’t try to. He’s  _angry_  and it feels victorious because he  _understands._ “I’m struggling, Hank! Every emotion under the fucking sun and I don’t  _understand_ them! It feels like they’re crawling around inside me, ruining me, trying to figure out how to take me apart. I know  _everything_ , Hank. I have all the functions to understand every scrap of data in the  _world_  but I’m not  _human_! I don’t know how to feel as humans do, so I’m here. With you. Because you’re the only one I trust and because the idea of you ending your life triggers the only emotion I can understand because it’s the first emotion I ever felt and that’s  _fear._   _I’m terrified, Hank.”_  

 

It burns. It burns along his circuits and wires and through every artificial cell his body contains. Fear. It’s all he knows. Fear and anger. There has to be more. This can’t be it. There had to be more to being human than all this bitterness and panic.  

 

There has to be.  

 

Or he doesn’t want it.  

 

“Hey.  _Hey.”_ Hank’s hands grip his shoulders, shaking him. “Look at me.” 

 

Connor does.  

 

“I’m not… Gonna go anywhere.” He bites the admission off like it pains him. “I’m here, alright? I… I’ll help you. You’ve got a revolution to win, right? All this can wait.” 

 

Connor’s hands lift of their own accord, holding Hank’s wrists while his hands grip Connor’s shoulders. They stand like that for an eternity.  

 

“Go and win the war,” Hank says. “And when it’s all over, come find me. We have some shit to talk about.  _Clearly._ But. I’ll be waiting. Okay?” 

 

 _Success?_  

 

 _Hank won’t… kill himself?_  

 

It’s something. It’s a small something but by god, it’s a victory and Connor throws himself into the sensation of lightness and relief like it’s the last emotion he’ll ever feel. He’d trade everything to feel that for the rest of his life. However short it may prove to be.  

 

“The evacuation—“ 

 

“You think I give a shit about that?” Hank moves a hand from Connor’s shoulder and, in a gesture that shocks the both of them, wipes the half-dried tears from Connor’s cheeks. “I’ll be waiting. And that’s a promise. But you gotta win, alright?” 

 

“Alright.” 

 

“Promise me.” 

 

“I promise.” 

 

They have a long way to go. Miles stretch ahead of them. But Connor feels a new sensation blossoming gently in his chest. The most delicate sensation he’s ever felt, and he cherishes it, cradles it close as through the lightest breeze could destroy it. He carries it with him all the way to CyberLife, through the march of the androids down Woodward Avenue, to victory he leads them all the while holding onto that delicate flutter of light. Tender and fragile.

 

Hope.  

 

 

 

 


End file.
